Good article on Sam Darnold

[MaroonBells]

https://www.purpleinsider.football/p/its...to-fulfill

By now you have been made aware of Darnold’s rough road to get here. Wildly inconsistent play, bad numbers, struggling organizations, poor supporting casts and all that jazz. But you might not fully realize just how big the obstacles were in his previous stops.

In 2018 the former star USC quarterback took over a Jets team whose roster was in peril and coach on the hot seat. The Jets’ receivers ranked 28th by PFF, run game 27th and the O-line 21st. The defense finished 29th in points allowed. The offensive coordinator had one total year as an OC in his career before joining New York and he was fired quickly from that gig.

Darnold had a lot of rough games but the good ones didn’t always get rewarded. On December 23, 2018, Darnold led the Jets to 38 points behind 341 yards and three touchdowns against the Packers. And his team lost.....

more at the link...

[Bullazin]

I would think KOC could grow if he tailors his offense to feature Jones and Chandler a lot at least until TJ is back.

That said I doubt it, I think it will be similar play balance as in the past and he will simply expect Darold to deliver.

[StickierBuns]

The table is set for Darnold. This is his time to turn his career around. But has the mental damage already been done? Will he turn the ball over in crucial situations? Its very obvious from the players on offense that they've noticed his arm talent. He's only 27 years old.

Like I continue to say: I'm rooting for Sam, but I don't expect him to be consistent. I expect some bad habits to creep back in. I just read something this morning that said McCarthy blew the coaches away when he got to Training Camp on how much he improved from May OTAs. And then TC and the preseason game took it to the point where they thought he might compete to start earlier than they ever thought. So even if Mr. Darnold turns it around, this ain't his team.

[Zanary]

I would think KOC could grow if he tailors his offense to feature Jones and Chandler a lot at least until TJ is back.

That said I doubt it, I think it will be similar play balance as in the past and he will simply expect Darold to deliver.

I'm admittedly split on what I expect. KOC defaults to QBs/passing, but Jones was a big pickup for the team...and they kept him in bubble wrap all preseason. Hopefully, that means that our pass-happy head coach will be trying to balance the offense more, or at least in respect to a given game situation.

I'm actually pretty optimistic about Darnold, but there's no saying how long it'll take the offense to "gel" around its new field general. If he can look the part early and often, our offense has the tools to do serious damage. That said, KOC needs to use the whole offense, and to figure out the IOL/OG situation NOW.

[MaroonBells]

This was the part of the article that caught my eye....

While Vikings fans have been well trained to bemoan the offensive line, last year was very different from the past in terms of pass protection. PFF graded them as the second best pass blocking team in the NFL behind Philadelphia. There were 24 QBs with at least 100 pressured drop-backs that were pressured at a higher rate than Kirk Cousins and his 5.2% sack rate was sixth best in the NFL.

Statistically speaking there is nothing more clear than the importance of keeping Darnold in clean pockets. His PFF grades when pressured from 2019 to 2022 were 35.1, 54.7, 33.3 and 50.4. Nobody is good under pressure but his average grade over the last four years would put him between 25th-30th. That’s not going to get the job done.

One number working in his favor is the percentage of pressure that he causes. From 2019-2022, Darnold ranked 6th, 14th, 13th and 9th best in terms of percentage of pressure that he caused himself. So we can say with some certainty that his safety in the pocket will come down to the line rather than him holding the ball too long.

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It was a very small sample size (one series), but I was impressed with how quickly Sam got rid of the ball in the Raider game. While Kirk was a more accurate QB, he would sometimes hold the ball longer than he should. While Sam's gunslinger style will unquestionably result in more interceptions, I think there's a pretty decent chance he takes fewer sacks than Kirk.